In resent months I have come to the idea that a truck camper is probably my best option for the overland vehicle I am looking for. For a while I had considered getting a van and converting it but as this vehicle will become my primary transport as well a van won’t really work. Being able to separate camper from truck will make it more fesable.

The bonus of a truck camper is that all the comforts anyone would want for extended travel. Truck campers have a bed that doesn’t need to be made each day, a kitchen and table and most have a bathroom with shower. Another advantage is that they have heating and cooling systems and can be insulated to combat colder temperatures.

So in general I am looking for a few things. I am hoping that the entire vehicle will be as light / small as possible. While I don’t plan on doing major rock crawling with the camper attached being able to go off road. Being light will also help with some of the other compromises this rig will have to deal with.

First compromise is that of payload. I am amazed at the small weights that pick ups can carry. That said for day to day driving the smaller the rig the better as fuel economy will already be much worse than I am used to. The second compromise is that of shipping. In order to get to some of the places in the world (South America included) it is necessary to ship your vehicle. Lower weight will hopefully provide some advantage to me. One shipping issue still to be overcome will be the height of the rigs below as I am fairly sure they wont fit within a shipping container, something I may have to figure out.

So these are the current short list that research has told me would be good options for what I am thinking of.

The Adventurer website states that this camper can fit on Nissan Titan and Toyota Tundra trucks and all of the pictures show it on a Ford F150. I am not so certain though as the weights quoted and the suggested amount you need to consider for your own belongings exceed the max payloads of those trucks. The nice thing about the Adventurer Campers is that they advertise 4 season insulation as a standard which is a definate plus.

The Laredo SC is heavier than the 80RB and would need a bigger truck, which it looks like I will have to do anyways. One nice thing about this rig is how it makes use of a Cassette Toilet. If you are going to have a toilet then you will have to deal with the nasty mess that is left behind. In North America camp grounds have waste disposal areas where the RV’s dump their tanks through a hose you carry with the truck but outside of the USA and Canada these facilities are not common. As gross as it may seem to someone that has not used RV’s or trailers, having a cassette that you can take to an appropriate disposal area (any toilet really) is an important consideration if you have a bathroom on board.

This camper has been designed and launched in the last year or two and was designed to fit the Ford 150. It is the lightest as well as the shortest camper I have listed and still retains having a bathroom. Anything smaller and lighter comes with that big compromise and isn’t currently a part of the thought process. A very big thing that I like about this camper is that the floor length is only 6.5 feet long which means that it will not hang over the end of the typical truck. The other campers either need to have an 8 foot truck bed or there will be overhang which doesn’t seem ideal to me even though the manufactures say that isn’t a problem.

This rig is not a truck camper but I saw it recently and thought it was cool. It is the most expensive idea on this list and would require me to drive a motorhome to work every day but it is a self contained unit that would easily fit in a shipping container. The Mercedes Sprinter van chassis is also a very capable truck and should be able to get to where ever I would want to go with a camper. The other very cool thing about this RV is how flexable it is to a variety of different applications.

So that is where I am at the moment. Do you or anyone you know have any experience with these or other RV’s / Truck Campers that may be useful? If so I would love to hear about it.

For many years I avoided going to the almost endless range of trade shows that show up in the Greater Toronto Area. For the most part the exhibitors didn’t change from year to year and the deals were really not good enough for me to want to part with my money. This year though with potential large purchases on the way will be different.

First up this year was the Motorcycle Supershow. I usually go to this event to dream up new adventures on my bike. I have spent the time looking at racing schools, motocross adventures and different tour routes. As with everyone else there I also check out the new bikes and spend time dreaming about what I would do with this new ride.

This season wasn’t any different. Having not been on my bike for about 3 months now it is nice to get out and think about riding again, and maybe my next motorbike.

Today was the Toronto RV Show and Sale. From some of my research it is a good idea to buy at shows like this. Even today I was told that the best deals happen as the dealers have paid a lot of money to be there so they want to sell product. The RV show gives a very good snap shot of the industry in Canada and it unfortunately does not really cater to the Overlanding ideal.

Looking for ideas for the Overlanding vehicle.

Most of the vehicles on sale are massive bus style RV’s or travel trailers. The market in Canada is apparetly too small for the variety of different options available in the US to bother being sold. Big for me is the fact that very few dealers in the area bring in Truck Campers, something I was hoping to see more of. I met with Paul Harris from Lance Campers and had a great chat. He told me that he was trying to convince dealers to bring them up but so far no good.

So what next. There are a lot of choice if I choose to purchase a van conversion. These are nice vehicles but they are very expensive. It will also mean I have to use an RV as my daily driver as I am just not able to maintain two cars. So if I am going with a truck camper I may have to head south of the border and import one back. According to Paul the closest place I can see a Lance truck camper is near Montreal! I am not certain what issue I will have in importing a camper from the US. Sounds like a bunch of paperwork to me!